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Kew Swings with PRG Europe
Kew Gardens is best known as the home of one of the world’s leading collections of plants both for scientific research and horticultural purposes, but to many regulars it’s also famous for its evening entertainment in the form of Summer Swing at Kew.
The five-day event has been running for the past 23 years, and Bruce Kirk has been working on it for 22 of those. The event began as a promenade concert inside the beautiful Temperate House, once the largest plant house in the world and now the world's largest surviving Victorian glass structure. Bruce was lighting designer for the second concert and soon became overall production manager. He is now Kew’s consultant production manager for this and other major events at the gardens.
“When I first started working on the event, it was for a few hundred people inside the Temperate House,” explains Bruce. “Now we have 5,500 in the audience every evening and it’s a major logistical operation.”
But it’s not just the festival which is getting bigger – the rig is too and, with lighting supplied by PRG Europe, it looks more impressive than ever before. Normally, before the sun goes down, the lighting on the stage does not add much to the ambient light. However, with the addition of six of the new VL3500 luminaires from Vari-Lite, the beams could clearly be seen even when the sun was shining brightly.
“The new VL3500s are great,” exclaims Bruce, adding: “They have the facility for a spot beam in the centre with a variable wash around it, so it can pick out the performers while still creating light on the stage. It’s a great effect and really helps create a contrast against the strength of the sun setting behind the temperate house.”
Most of the area of the gardens remains open during load in and out, but a kilometre of barriers and a large contingent of staff and stewards ensure the public’s safety during this busy time by keeping them a safe distance
away. “The management is, of course, very keen to make sure no damage is done – we work very hard to maintain the highest levels of safety throughout the production period.” Metal trackway is put down to stop vehicles churning
up the grass, and only the bare minimum number of cars are allowed to park within the gardens.
Not only Bruce but the crew also have worked on the event for a number of years, and in the backstage area – the rear of the Temperate House – are a number of tents, plus a caravan which belongs to PRG’S crew chief Jerry
Hodgson, where they sleep, making their day significantly more civilised. Although they still have late nights, staying on site means they can sleep in until they need to start at 11am.
In the week before Summer Swing, Bruce acted as production coordinator for Kew working on the BBC’s massive live outside broadcast for Saving Planet Earth. This required very careful management of the BBC’s OB requirements
and 200 strong crew and staff. Sixteen Portakabins were craned in for dressing rooms and Bruce’s role was to ensure that the BBC production team could complete their job while working within the site restrictions of this world heritage site. This included the need to ensure that everything was loaded in and out safely and that crew, gardens, staff and visitors suffered minimal inconvenience. While small areas of the gardens and Temperate House could be closed, much of it had to be kept open so as to allow access.
In addition to stage lighting, Bruce also lit the Temperate House itself both from the outside and the inside with a mixture of Vari-Lite luminaires, PAR cans and 400w MBI discharge sources. He used the same high powered lamps
in blue, white and green once it got dark to highlight some of the cedar pines near the lighting control tower.
The event began and ended with Jools Holland and Lulu, with the Music of Dirty Dancing, Björn Again and Eliades Ochoa – star of the Buena Vista Social Club – also appearing. For the first time, there was also a Swing Festival Village, with food and drinks on sale. Crew chief for PRG Europe was Jerry Hodgson; stage lighting designer was Simon Anderson; and project manager was Peter Marshall.
12th October 2007
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